


Being 5'7

by ESawyer



Category: The Book of Mormon - Ambiguous Fandom, The Book of Mormon - Parker/Stone/Lopez
Genre: 12daysofBOM, Disclaimer: I have no idea how ice hockey works, Kevin plays ice hockey, M/M, You see where this is going I'm sure, but its a day late sorry lads, connor is a figure skater, or figure skating for that matter, short kevin and blond mckinley rights, so if you're an ice hockey and or figure skating expert dont expect this to be accurate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:53:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28288749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ESawyer/pseuds/ESawyer
Summary: According to Arnold Cunningham, being 5'7 is the best thing that has ever happened to Kevin Price.
Relationships: Elder "Connor" McKinley/Kevin Price
Comments: 12
Kudos: 32
Collections: 12 Days of Book of Mormon (2020)





	Being 5'7

**Author's Note:**

> Last day of 12DaysofBOM!! (But a day late soz)  
> This is a gift to....everyone??? I guess. IDK if anyone wants this but I saw one tiktok of an hockey player and a figure skater at 2 AM and my mind started going as it does. 
> 
> Enjoy!!!

“Can someone _please_ get that blond prick off the ice?” 

Kevin spun around at the sound of his captain’s voice. He worried for a moment, wondering if _he_ was the blond prick before he remembered that his hair was brown. His eyes scanned the rink until he saw the blond prick that Neeley was so angry about, and was momentarily mesmerised by the way he glided across the ice, seamlessly dipping in an out of various moves that Kevin probably wouldn’t have been able to do it if his life depended on it. 

“Leave him,” Kevin found himself saying, “He’s not in the way,” 

Neeley groaned and punched his arm, “Stop falling in love with every man you lay eyes on,” 

“You were the exception to that,” Kevin said, “I’d rather gouge my eyes out with my skates,” 

James snorted and looked over at the blond prick, head tilted to the side a little. 

“Oh,” he said, “I know him. It’s Chris’ best friend,” 

“Can you tell him to fuck off then?” Neeley asked, “If we haven’t started by the time coach gets here, he’ll kill us,” 

James snorted again, “Not a chance. Chris is already pissed off at me because I was snoring last night, if he finds out I told his best friend to fuck off...” he trailed off with a sigh, “He’ll smother me in my sleep,” 

Neeley turned to Kevin with a sickly sweet smile that put him on edge. Before he could say that he was absolutely _not_ going to tell the blond prick to fuck off, Neeley had spun him around and given him a little shove forward with a whispered threat of benching him for the rest of the season if he didn’t get the prick off their rink. 

Kevin wanted to argue that the rink didn’t _actually_ belong to them, and belonged to Boston University, but quickly decided against it. 

He hesitantly skated over to the prick, wary of the one-legged spin that he was doing because for once, he hadn’t woken up in the sort of mood where he wanted to have his throat slit. 

“Uh...excuse me? Hello? Uh....Mr Skater Man? _Helloooo?_ ” 

If he heard him, he didn’t seem interested in stopping and skated away from him with the sort of grace that Kevin had not been blessed with. 

“Dude!” Kevin yelled, quickly catching up with him and grabbing his arm. 

“Do you mind?” he asked indignantly, wrenching his earphone out of his ear and spinning around to face him, “I’m training!” 

Whatever Kevin was going to say got lost on the way up to his mouth. He was momentarily distracted by how striking the blond prick looked with bright blue eyes and pale skin tinged pink by the cold. 

“Have you been hit by one too many pucks in your life?” he snapped. 

“Sorry,” Kevin said quickly, deciding not to tell him that he most definitely had been, “I just - we’re, um...training and you’re...in the way,” 

The prick's eyes narrowed and Kevin found himself slowly backing away. 

“I was here first,” he said, “You idiots are in _my_ way,” 

Kevin pressed his lips together, “Okay, sure, but....the season starts soon and-” 

“I’m training for the Olympics,” he said bluntly, “I’m staying,” 

“But-” 

“Are you training for the Olympics?”

“No, but-” 

“Fuck off, then,” 

Kevin dejectedly skated back over to the rest of the team. Neeley mimed strangling him for a moment before snapping at them to get into position for their warm up and telling them that no one was allowed to be nice to Kevin for the rest of the day. 

“He’s called Connor. He’s single,” James whispered to him, and Kevin pretended that that wasn’t the best thing he had heard all week. 

* * *

Kevin did not plan to forgo studying for his next biology test to find out all that he could possibly could about the blond prick, but he _did_ just happen to find out that his full name was Connor McKinley, had been skating since he was five years old, had won that State Championship _three times,_ the World Championship _twice_ and was going to the Olympics in six months. 

He also didn’t plan for his roommate to come home and find him stalking Connor’s Instagram account. 

“Are you trying to fuck him, or have you decided that hockey isn’t for you and you want to try figure skating?” 

“Neither!” 

Arnold snorted and flopped onto the sofa beside him and snatched his phone out of his hand. Kevin watched as he scrolled Connor’s feed, half hoping for some advice. It was extremely rare that Kevin took Arnold’s advice, but he had been in a relationship for the last four years, and Kevin had been perpetually single. 

What he _hadn’t_ wanted him to do, was follow Connor on Instagram and send him a message. 

“What was that for?” Kevin yelled, snatching his phone back, “Why did you just do that?” 

“Because I figured that if you want to fuck him, you need to talk to him first, and if you want to get into figure skating, you also need to talk to him,”

Annoyingly, Kevin couldn't argue with that logic. 

* * *

Two days later, Connor still hadn’t replied to his (Arnold’s?) message, and he was just about ready to die of embarrassment. 

At first, Kevin had thought that maybe he hadn’t been on Instagram for a while, so maybe he hadn’t seen the message, but then he posted a video of himself doing a triple axel (which, according to the comments, was incredibly impressive) and then a read receipt showed up underneath his message, so Kevin resigned himself to the fact that he wasn’t interested. 

Arnold told him that the reason he hadn’t replied was because he was threatened by how sexy he was. Kevin told him that he had to stop calling him sexy, because that was why everyone thought they were together. 

“I think he’s intimidated because you’re a sexy hockey player,” Arnold said, “A sexy hockey player who’s gonna go to med school. Beauty _and_ brains,” 

“So he’s not talking to me because I’m the ideal boyfriend?” Kevin asked. 

“You’re not the _ideal_ boyfriend, so there’s still a chance he will talk to you,” 

Kevin turned to glare at him, “What do you mean I’m not the ideal-” 

“You’re 5’7, buddy,” Arnold said, with the same expression as a Doctor did when they were delivering awful news, “And that makes you _less_ sexy, so you still have a chance. Really, being 5’7 is the best thing that’s ever happened to you,” 

* * *

Connor was not at the next practice, or the one after that. Or even the one after that, and Kevin was beginning to accept his fate of dying lonely. 

That was until he had to leave practice early one day (thanks to a well aimed puck by Neeley) and slouched off to the changing rooms, trying his very best to stop his nose from spurting blood everywhere. 

“Oh. Hi,” 

Kevin started at the sound of a voice and knocked right into one of the benches, pain shooting up his leg. 

“ _Fuck.”_ he gasped, “Fuck my life. Fuck my life. Fuck my life. Fuck my-” he collapsed onto the bench and looked up, immediately groaning, “Fuck my life,” 

Connor smiled awkwardly at him, “Bad practice?” 

“Bad week, more like” Kevin mumbled, shoving his skates into his bag all whilst trying to keep his nose in the air. 

“Hey, lemme help with your nose,” 

Before Kevin could tell him that he really didn’t need any help - least of all off _him_ \- Connor had sat next to him and began to gently dab at his nose. Kevin tensed up, uncomfortably aware of the fact that their legs were touching and that whatever cologne Connor was wearing smelt really, _really_ nice and he knew that whatever _he_ smelt like, it wasn’t at all attractive. 

“So, did you win the bet?” 

Kevin frowned, wondering if the puck had hit him harder than he had thought. 

“Bet?” 

“...the bet to message me on Instagram?” Connor said slowly, “Please don’t play dumb, it makes it even more insulting,” 

Kevin turned to look at him, “There was no - There was no _bet,_ I just wanted to message you...” 

Connor jerked away from him, his eyebrows raised, “Why?” 

“Uh, because - uh....well, for the - for the reasons that people usually message other people on Instagram for?” Kevin said, hoping that the amount of blood on his face would distract from his cheeks suddenly turning red. 

Connor didn’t say anything, and Kevin was forcefully reminded of why he didn’t try and flirt with people. He couldn’t remember the last time that it had actually worked out for him. 

“Sorry, you’re _gay?_ ” 

Kevin blinked at him, “Yes...” 

“Oh,” Connor said softly, now absentmindedly dabbing the tissue on Kevin’s cheek and smearing him with even more blood, “I thought - I thought you were making fun of me,” 

“Why?”

“Because I’m a gay figure skater who wears sparkly outfits? Hockey players normally make fun of me. And footballers. And basketball players,” he frowned, “I guess most athletes do,”

He frowned at his lap for a moment before looking back up at Kevin with a grin and placing the tissue in Kevin’s hand. 

“I gotta go and train,” he said brightly, “but I’ll message you later?” 

Maybe Arnold had been right about being 5'7.

* * *

Kevin was struggling through an essay when his phone lit up with a notification. He dropped what he was doing at once, taking a moment to punch the air when he realised that it was from the one person that he had been dying to have a notification off for the last two days.

**Connor.McKinley:** **_Hey! Sorry I’ve been MIA, I gave myself a couple days off from training and I didn’t move lol_ **

It was at this point that Kevin remembered he had next to no social skills and Arnold, who had _marginally_ better social skills was at Nabulungi’s for the evening. He typed out varying degrees of the same message for almost half an hour before he realised that he needed to just bite the bullet and actually say something. 

**Price19:** **_Hi._ **

“ _Whyy_ ,” Kevin groaned, dropping his phone to his desk and putting his head in his hands. 

**Connor.McKinley:** **_You’re conversational_ **

**Price19:** **_Sorry, I’m bad at texting_ **

For some reason, Connor took that as an invitation to video call him. Kevin stared down at the _Connor.McKinley is calling..._ box that had popped up on his screen and dropped his phone to his desk. 

He lurched across his desk to put the lamp on and answered the call, trying to smooth his hair into some sort of acceptable style. 

“Hi,” Connor said with a grin, “Since you’re incapable of communicating over text, I thought this would be better,” 

“Yeah, I-” Kevin stopped, leaning closer to his phone, “Are you at the rink?” 

Connor flashed him a grin before turning his phone around and showing him the empty ice rink, “Got bored, needed something to do,” 

“It’s almost midnight,” 

“And I would like a gold medal one day,” Connor said, “Which, by the way, is a lot harder than I thought,” 

Kevin laughed, “Yeah. I figured it would be,” 

Connor shrugged, grunting a little as he jumped into a spin and landed as perfectly as he always did. Kevin wondered, for a moment, if Connor was showing off just because they were talking. Then he remembered that the Olympics were probably a lot more important to him than a random guy who could barely hold a conversation. 

He watched, as mesmerised as ever, as Connor began skating backwards, one foot in the air behind him. Before Kevin could ask how he managed to get through any training without killing himself, he spoke again. 

“Promise this isn’t some sort of homophobic prank?” 

Kevin silently leant to the side and pointed to the pride flag that hung above his bed, “Not homophobic,” 

Connor grinned at him, “Meet me on the ice, then?” 

In the four years that he had been at university, Kevin had never walked to the ice rink so fast in his life, heart beating with nervous excitement. He wasn’t sure if this was a date, or just a _thing,_ or if he was about to be on the receiving end of a homophobic attack, but he was glad that his face wasn’t covered in blood. 

When he got there, Connor was still zooming around the rink, seemingly in his own little world. He didn’t look up when Kevin called his name, and he didn’t want to interrupt him when he seemed so in the zone. 

Quietly, Kevin kicked his trainers off and pulled on his skates, lacing them up with shaky hands that he didn’t think had anything to do with the cold. He had not even text Arnold to tell him where he was going, convinced that telling him was going to jinx what he was hoping would end up being something good. 

“Hey!” Connor said, skating over to the side of the rink and grinning at him, “Sorry, I didn’t see you,” 

“It’s okay,” Kevin said, quickly joining him, “You seemed really in it, I didn’t want to interrupt you,” 

“ _Please_ interrupt me,” he groaned, beginning to skate backwards away from him, “I’m so tired. All I ever do these days is skate,” 

Kevin assumed that was an invitation to follow him, so he did, ever so slightly insecure. Connor skated like he was gliding in the air, Kevin lumbered along, missing the feeling of his hockey stick in his hands. 

“What else do you expect to do?” Kevin asked. 

Connor laughed, casually spinning around as he did. 

“I mean, I love it. _Obviously_ I love it, but I have no social life. It’ll be worth it when I get to Paris. That’s where the next Olympics are,” he added just when Kevin was about to ask what Paris had to do with anything, “What about you? Aiming for the NHL?” 

Kevin shook his head, “No. I mean, I love it, and I know I’m gonna miss it when I graduate but I’m going to med school after this. I wanna be a doctor more than I wanna be a hockey player,” 

Connor came to a screeching halt, and Kevin just about managed to stop himself from crashing right into him. 

“Sorry. _Med school?_ ” he laughed. 

“Why’s - Why’s that funny?” 

“I just - don’t take this the wrong way but I thought you were a bit dumb,” 

Kevin stared at him, affronted, “I have a 4.0 GPA!” he refrained from adding a ‘somehow’ onto the end of that sentence, despite not knowing how he had been able to keep that up for the entire year. There were days when he thought that his dad was paying the college to keep his grades up so he would actually graduate and get into med school. 

Connor laughed again and held up his hands, “I’m sorry. Obviously you’re not dumb, I take it back,” 

Kevin scowled at him, but found that he couldn’t keep himself from smiling when Connor started giggling. 

“Has anyone ever told you that you look like an angry kitten?” Connor asked. 

“Did you bring me here to insult me?”

“That’s not an insult! Kittens are cute. So are you!” 

It was like a klaxon had gone off in his brain, and bright red flashing letters appeared in front of him reading; _FLIRTING. FLIRTING. FLIRTING._ Only, acknowledging the fact that someone was flirting with him was a lot easier than flirting back. Instead of telling him that he found him cute too, Kevin awkwardly laughed and then launched into a story of that one time he shattered his knee cap in a freak injury. 

If Connor cared about the fact that Kevin was incapable of flirting, he didn’t say anything. He listened to his story intently, gasping and laughing where appropriate and even pouted when Kevin told him about the arduous recovery process. 

“But your knee is okay now?” Connor asked, skating one-legged circles around him. 

“Are you showing off?” 

“Now, why would I be doing that?” Connor asked, before kicking off the ground and spinning through the air, “Is your knee okay, though?” 

Kevin nodded, “Yeah. I guess,”

“ _Sooo,_ I can teach you some moves?” 

“If it involves being in the air, no,” 

Connor laughed and skated towards him, “What if it’s just a pairs dance?” 

Kevin pursed his lips, casting his mind back to the few times that he had seen figure skating before, "You're not throwing me across the ice. I've seen what you do in those dances," 

“No one is throwing anyone,” 

“So, what are we-” 

“I’m just trying to get you to hold my hands,” 

“Oh,” Kevin said, wondering why he had never been blessed with common sense, "Oh. Okay,” 

Kevin didn’t think he had ever embarrassed himself so much in his life. Whenever Connor tried to help him through something that was a little more complicated than his usual launching himself around an ice rink at an alarmingly fast speed, he ended up on the floor. The first time it had been funny, the fifth time he was quite sure he was going to die of embarrassment. 

“Come on!” Connor giggled, pulling him back to his feet, “It’s _one_ spin. You don’t even have to do anything! Just hold my hands,” 

Kevin groaned and took Connor’s hands. He didn’t even give Kevin time to prepare; he kicked off the ground and the rink around them blurred. He felt Connor’s fingers slip out of his and before he could try and maintain some semblance of dignity, his feet had given way beneath him. 

Worse, he had brought Connor right down with him, their noses inches apart. 

“Hi,” Connor said, awkwardly straddling him, “How are you a hockey player and so bad at ice skating?” 

“I’m not!” Kevin exclaimed, “I’m just bad at _your_ type of skating. You wouldn’t last 5 minutes in a hockey match!” 

“Would I not?” 

“No, you wouldn’t!” Kevin said, completely unaware that Connor was leaning closer to him, “because if you were doing all that spinny shit, you’d be-” 

Kevin’s _extremely_ interesting explanation of exactly why Connor’s spinny shit would be so out of place was cut short by Connor closing the gap between them. Or, more importantly, the gap between their _lips._ He froze for a fraction of a second before reciprocating and was secretly glad for the opportunity to slide his hands underneath Connor’s jumper to try and keep them warm. 

“ _Agh!”_ Connor exclaimed, jumping back from him, “Your hands are so fucking cold!” 

“You’re the one who kissed me when we’re lying on ice!” Kevin shot back, though he was beginning to realise that maybe that had been a _little_ weird, “What did you expect?” 

Connor snorted, “Sorry. Weird place to kiss you,” 

“I’m not complaining!” Kevin said quickly, “Just...cold,” 

“Alright, let's go somewhere warmer,” Connor said, struggling to his feet and pulling Kevin with him, “They’ll be some restaurant open, right?” 

“Are you asking me on a date?” 

“Are you saying yes to me asking you on a date?” Connor asked, pulling him along after him as he skated towards the rink entrance. 

He pretended to think about it for a moment as he sat down and pulled his skates off, stretching his feet out. 

“Kevin!” Connor exclaimed, “Are you saying yes?” 

“Yeah,” Kevin said with a grin, his essay completely forgotten, “I’m saying yes,” 

Connor beamed at him as he changed back into his normal shoes, babbling about all the different places that they could go to eat. Kevin found that he didn’t really care where he went, as long as the night didn’t end for at least three more hours.

“Ready?” he asked. 

“Yup. I think we could go to that place on - _Jesus,_ you’re tiny. I never realised how much height your skates gave you," 

Kevin scowled at him (or rather, _up_ at him) and crossed his arms in a way that he hoped didn’t make him look like a petulant child. 

“I’m not tiny! I’m 5’7!” he exclaimed, like it at all helped his case. 

“Never said it was a bad thing,” Connor said, “I think it’s cute,” 

Perhaps being 5’7 _was_ the best thing that ever happened to him.

**Author's Note:**

> HAPPY HOLIDAYS LADS!!!!! xx
> 
> and thanks for reading :D


End file.
